2010
Learn more about the surgeons of Columbia University Medical Center by viewing clips of recent news coverage, referencing their contributions to the professional literature, noting awards they've received, and reading the consumer and professional newsletters published by the Department of Surgery.
Very Simulating: The Launch of the NYP/Columbia Simulation Center
NYP and CUMC launch a simulation center.
Committing collectively to continuous knowledge, enhanced judgment, and superior skill, NewYork- Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center, launched their Simulation Center in an ongoing effort to advance the continuum of wellness throughout the patient lifecycle.
Juxtaposing medicine and aviation, David Williams, MD, Professor of Surgery at the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine, McMaster University, was guest speaker at the launch, titled: "Very Simulating: How Flying in Space Relates to Health Care" on November 22.
On the subject of making errors, Dr. Williams, an aquanaut and NASA Astronaut, told the audience during his packed presentation that "the trick is to learn what mistakes you can make that are acceptable and what mistakes you can't make-and then build in redundancies so you don't create those errors."
November 7, 2010:
Three NewYork-Presbyterian patients ran in the New York City Marathon with surgeons and staff who saved their lives.
Timothy Sweeney, who had double lung transplant surgery just one year ago, ran with his transplant surgeon, Joshua Sonett, MD.
Jessica Chipkin, along with multiple members of the liver transplant team, ran for the second time since her liver transplant in 2005, when her liver failed due to Wilson's disease.
Benjamin Carey, who underwent surgery for an aortic root aneurysm exactly one year prior to this year's marathon, ran with his heart surgeon, Allan Stewart, MD.
NYP/Columbia Patients and Surgeons Run NYC Marathon 
EXPERIENCE THE HYBRID — Take a 360° Tour
Lighting fast, leading-edge medical imaging system —the Division of Vascular Surgery and Endovascular Interventions at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center (NYPH/CUMC), is utilizing Siemens Artis Zeego®.
Giving patients more complete information than any other imaging system, The Division of Vascular Surgery and Endovascular Interventions at NYPH/CUMC, is advancing patients' vascular care to a higher dimension.
Leading all other hospitals in fostering space-age technology, the Division had patients in mind when they installed five of these new 3D imaging systems.
Good news for treating aneurysms; carotid disease; critical limb ischemia; hemodialysis; lower extremity vascular disease; and venous disease.
As well, vascular non-invasive laboratory duplex and physiologic studies and wound care, with special emphasis on evolving endovascular therapies, all benefit from the device's robotized C-arm.
Enhancing accurate diagnosis for surgical management of patients with this futuristic device, the Division of Vascular Surgery and Endovascular Interventions at NYPH/CUMC has an intuitive imaging system for anatomical detail, which eases imaging of essential vascular regions for precise diagnosis of vascular abnormalities, providing complete control in the OR.
NewYork-Presbyterian in U.S. News 2010 Top 10:
Sixth in U.S., First in New York Area
This marks the 10th consecutive year that NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital has been listed on the U.S. News "Honor Roll.
In its specialty ranking, U.S. News ranked NYP sixth in the adult and pediatric "Heart & Heart Surgery" categories.
Department of Surgery Blog
The Department of Surgery blog is up and running at http://www.columbiasurgery.net/.
Read posts about new procedures and innovations, patient stories, and research.
Visit the blog regularly or sign up to receive notifications about new posts via RSS (click the orange icon under the header), or via email (click "subscribe by email" on the right side of the page).
Columbia Surgeons are New York Magazine 2010 Top Doctors
Twelve faculty members from the Columbia University Department of Surgery have been named to New York magazine's 2010 list of Best Doctors.
Dr. Grant Appointed Medical Director of NYP Medical Staff Office
Robert Grant, MD, has been appointed Medical Director of NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital's Medical Staff Office.
Dr. Grant will continue in his current role as Chief of NYP's combined Divisions of Plastic Surgery.
In this new role, Dr. Grant will work on medical staff issues, with particular focus on the areas of credentialing and privileging, as well as physician practice evaluations.
He will report to Dr. Richard Liebowitz, Associate Chief Medical Officer and Vice President, Medical Affairs.
Kidney Transplant Milestone
More than 600 kidney transplantation patients, donors and their families reunited with their medical teams for a heartfelt celebration of a second chance at life.
The April 21, 2010 festivities marked the milestone of the 3,000th kidney transplant at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia.
The reunion was national news, featured on more than 50 CBS affiliate stations across the country.
Locally, it was covered by the Daily News, New York Post, Manhattan Times and WCBS-TV.
Ray Ortega, MD, Attends West Point Founders Day
Dr. Ortega attended the West Point Society of New York Founders Day Dinner at New York's Union League Club on April 16, 2010.
Founders Day commemorates the date President Thomas Jefferson signed the document that founded the United States Military Academy at West Point.
This year's dinner was a salute to the Medal of Honor, the highest military decoration awarded by the United States government.
A 1978 graduate of West Point, Dr. Ortega holds military honors from his service in the U.S. Army, including a U.S. Army Ranger Tab, a U.S. Army Special Forces Green Beret, a U.S. Army Master Parachutist Badge, a German Marksmanship Medal (Bronze), and a Tunisian Paratrooper Award.
Dr. Ortega with Keynote Speaker Brian Williams, Anchor and managing Editor of NBC Nightly News, and Gemma Abaring |
Dr. Ortega with Col.(ret) Jack Jacobs, a Medal of Honor recipient for his heroic actions during the Vietnam War, who currently serves as a military analyst for MSNBC |
Drs. Kato and Oz Nominated for Time Magazine World's 100 Most Influential
Tomoaki Kato, MD |
Mehmet C. Oz, MD |
Dr. Tomoaki Kato and Dr. Mehmet Oz are among 200 "leaders, artists, innovators and icons" nominated as among the world's most influential people by Time Magazine.
By clicking the links on their names above you can cast votes in their favor.
Dr. Williams Named as One of New York's "Rising Stars"
Mathew Williams, MD, was listed in the 2010 Crain's New York Business "40 Under Forty," an annual list of 40 New Yorkers who have achieved success in business before turning 40.
A leader in advancing new surgical treatments for congenital heart defects, Dr. Emile Bacha has joined the pediatric cardiac surgery team at NewYork-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital.
Previously, Dr. Bacha was associate professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School and a senior cardiac surgeon at Children's Hospital in Boston, where he established a successful pediatric cardiac surgery program, including a minimally invasive surgery program.
Effective January 1, 2010, Dr. Smith was appointed Chairman of the Department of Surgery and Surgeon-in-Chief at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia and its Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Heart Hospital.
Dr. Smith has served as interim Chair of the department since 2007.
Healthpoints E-Newsletter Launches
The Department of Surgery Office of External Affairs has transitioned the popular triannual Healthpoints newsletter to an E-format.
The newsletter is now available on www.columbiasurgery.org and has been sent to an extensive mailing list.
Visitors to the surgery site can sign up to receive an e-newsletter for each new issue.
Read the Fall 2009 issue.
Sign up to receive the E-newsletter.
Laparoscopic Approach Offers Dramatically Improved Recovery for Liver Donor
Laparoscopic Approach Promises Dramatically Improved Recovery for the Organ Donor — Typically, a Parent Donating to Their Child
The laparoscopic liver retrieval is offered by Dr. Benjamin Samstein, Surgical Director of the Living Donor Liver Transplant Program, who first learned the technique from Daniel Cherqui of Hôpital Henri Mondor, Paris.
Standard pediatric liver implantation is led by Dr. Tomoaki Kato, Surgical Director, Liver and Gastrointestinal Transplantation.
The new surgical advance represents the latest chapter in a history of innovations in living organ donation by NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia surgeons.
Dr. Jean Emond, chief of transplantation, was a key member of the team that performed the first pediatric living donor liver transplantation in North America in 1989 while at the University of Chicago Medical Center.
Dr. Lloyd Ratner, director of renal and pancreatic transplantation, performed the nation's first adult-to-adult laparoscopic living donor kidney transplant in 1995 while at Johns Hopkins Medical Center.
Today more than half of kidney transplants are done with a living donor, and 80 percent of these are retrieved laparoscopically.
Read more about living donor liver retrieval and living organ transplantation at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center.
Few treatments are available to help obese adolescents who are unable to lose weight and are already suffering from obesity-related health problems. Laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding (LAGB), an option for adults in the United States since 2001, is showing promise for teens. The Center for Adolescent Bariatric Surgery, which opened at NewYork-Presbyterian Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital in 2006, recently performed its 100th LAGB procedure.
Machine Perfusion Outperforms Standard Cold-Storage Liver Preservation
James V. Guarrera, MD Preserving organs on ice prior to transplantation, an approach known as cold storage or CS, has been the standard practice in liver transplant for 20 years.
Now there is new evidence that a technique called hypothermic machine perfusion (HMP) may offer an improvement, according to the first-ever study comparing the impact of the two techniques on transplant outcomes.
The phase I study was carried out by Dr. James Guarrera and his colleagues at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center. Unlike cold storage, which Dr. Guarrera describes as a static technique, HMP dynamically simulates "aliveness" by providing a continuous flow of oxygen and key nutrients to the liver while diluting and removing toxins and waste products.
Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Heart Center Opens at
NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia
Ushering in a new era in comprehensive cardiac care, the Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Heart Center celebrated its opening on January 20, 2010 at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center.
The six-story, 142,000-square-foot building will officially open to patients and their families in February. First conceived more than five years ago, the new Heart Center was designed in collaboration with the Hospital's clinical team, including cardiac surgeons, cardiologists, nurses and other specialists.
"The Heart Center will allow NewYork-Presbyterian to continue on its path of advancing new treatments, a road that saw this Hospital perform the first successful pediatric heart transplant operation, the country's first robotically assisted open-heart procedure to be completed with a totally closed chest, and the country's first robotically assisted, totally endoscopic coronary artery bypass surgery, along with many other breakthroughs in cardiovascular research and patient care," says Dr. Craig R. Smith.
The opening was reported by the news outlets that included the Associated Press, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, Crains New York Business and PR Newswire.
Read the NYP press release.
Surgery Office of External Affairs Launches Services Group
ColumbiaCreative Rx, an events, web, and print services provider, offers a range of marketing and communications services across multiple platforms to departments across Columbia University Medical Center, as well as medical industry. |
